


Genesis

by queenmab24601



Series: Book of Adam [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Character Interpretation, Female Michael, Gen, Implied Relationships, Pre-Relationship, Runs parallel to Season 8
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-04-25
Packaged: 2018-01-20 17:24:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1518983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenmab24601/pseuds/queenmab24601
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Michael, in a temporary female vessel, seeks shelter and help for Adam post-Cage.<br/>She'd rather not go into details over how she got them out, but she needs help from a few old acquaintances. Time to call in the Pagans.</p><p>Artemis has met the Winchesters already. They thought she was some kind of love-struck goon. She's not overly fond. Plus, the task of running the Greek Pantheon has more or less fallen to her. It's a bad time for Athena to show up again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Genesis

      Michael is under no illusions as to how she’ll be received.  But the fact remains that years have passed while she’s been locked in the cage battling her brother and she needs to regain her footing.  Strategize.  See what has changed while she’s been away.

     The moment she woke up, officially, in the body of this vessel, she attempted to call Raphael. That was the order of governance, after all, if she was to fail in the Apocalypse. Raphael would assume control of heaven and close off the gates.  But when Michael calls out, all she gets is static. Next in line after Raphael would be Naomi – but when Michael reaches out for her, there is a kind of blockage. The phone is working, but no one’s picking up. As far as Michael can tell, the world, or earth at least, has continued on as normal. Say what you will about Dean and Sam (and Michael has – screamed it in those first centuries in an endless cry of fire and blood) but they do always manage to win out in the end.

     The situation leaves Michael in a bit of a bind. She can rig up a safe house, put up the usual wards, and convince the humans that nothing is wrong. But Adam needs assistance. It took her far too long to find him. Too much precious time wasted convincing the girl her body would be put to better use in Michael’s care. And all the while Adam laid body intact but soul in shreds at Stull.

    He is slung across her back now, a comforting warmth.  Michael would rather fly, but that could be fatally damaging. She checks every so often to make sure he is breathing, staring intently at her father’s favored creation. He looks so _young_ out of the cage.  Inside, protected by her second pair of wings, she watched him age to a startling degree. His projected image, a mirror of his outside – for that was how the human psyche handled the afterlife – faded moment by moment into wrinkles and fine lines. But now, he is more or less the same as when he’d said Yes to her. It is odd to look at a human and to see their surface rather than their soul. To view Adam’s high cheekbones and soft lashes fallen closed. His soul, it should be said, is more beautiful than most. Even after the cage. But because of the deal she made to get them out, she can’t see it now.

    Michael reaches their destination, an apartment building in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. She rings the bell for the penthouse. The good thing about New York – you ever see any Winchesters there? Well, maybe now, but Adam prefers “Milligan”. He told her several times. There were a lot of stories to be shared in the cage.

     “Hello?” a female voice sounds from the speakers. It is cool, professional.

     "Artemis.” Michael says.

     “Who is this?” The voice asks defensively. “If this is Aphrodite offering anonymous make-up hints again, she had best say goodbye to that new ride of hers. This time I’m not going to go easy.”

     “Artemis,” Michael repeats. “It’s me.”

    There’s a pause. Michael takes Adam off her back and leans him against her left shoulder. He fits snug against her, waist warm around her arm. She can protect him better this way. Sure enough, when she turns around, there’s Artemis with one hand on a cocked hip and eyebrows raised. Her head is tilted to the side in a manner that reminds Michael of Castiel, oddly enough.

    “Athena,” Artemis says. “Or should I say _Michael_.” If Artemis had the power she once did, Michael suspects actual venom would spit from her lips. As it is, she only looks poised to kill. Michael has had plenty of skill assessing threats. Artemis is high on the list, but not the one-woman killing machine she once was.

    “My brother was in hiding.” Michael says. “I needed to track him.” The first time Gabriel ran away from home, he didn’t go as far as the Norse. No, he stayed as close and traceable as the Greeks. The only question was which one he was. So Michael had gone undercover. It had been almost too easy. Zeus had been full enough of himself to _actually_ believe he had given birth from his head.

     The truth is that Metis’s daughter had died inside that constricting space. And she had begged when Michael whispered in that ear. It was a win-win solution for them both.

     “How dare you pick up a female body again,” Artemis is truly livid, but there’s something behind it. As though she’s too exhausted to really pick a fight.

     “I didn’t have much of a choice,” Michael shrugs. “In this body or coming here. He needs help.” She gestures to Adam, soft against her. “Is Apollo with you?”

     Artemis considers the boy for a moment. “I’m not in the habit of helping strange men. Or even men I know, really.”

    “Please, Artemis.” Michael says.

     This catches the goddess’s attention. She locks eyes with Michael and snaps her fingers – an irritating habit Gabriel was too quick to pick up.  

            Upstairs, where they have landed, Apollo is resting sock covered feet on a coffee table, leaning back against a million dollar couch, watching television. “Sister.” He greets Artemis. “And sister!” He stands with arms open to Michael. “It has been too long.”

            It is not as though Michael dislikes Apollo. Out of the Greeks, he is not the most objectionable. But he is rather fake, which she detests. “You don’t have to put up a front for me, Apollo.”

            He inclines his head in acquiescence. “Of course. And who is this?”

            “Adam. He’s my former vessel.”

            “He’s a little banged up.” Apollo walks over and brushes his fingers against Adam’s forehead. “Wow. Make that a lot banged up.”

            Something in Michael’s vessel tenses at the insult to Adam.  Like a stone forming in her chest. She rubs the spot absently. “It is my fault, I’m afraid. I lost a fight and he got caught in the crossfire.”

            “Lost a fight?” Artemis asks, from where she leans against the wall.

            “The Apocalypse.” Michael admits.

            “Some apocalypse. I didn’t even notice.”

            Apollo flicks his eyes between the two of them. There is little to be revealed in his eyes. He’s thinking then. Nothing good. “Well,” he begins after a while. “Lay him down on the couch.”

            Michael does, careful as she can. She’s a bit hesitant to let go, oddly.  Perhaps her vessel misses the warmth her brought against her side.

            “I can’t have both of you in here while I work,” Apollo says. His hands glow the light of the sun – a bright orange haze a fraction of the shine of Michael’s grace. She smiles at the thought. “So you girls can go talk it out in the next room.”

            Michael’s mouth downturns. There are many advantages to a female vessel – a better center of gravity, for one. But she hadn’t missed the casual misogyny. She turns to Artemis out of old habit. The goddess is rolling her eyes in a familiar gesture of solidarity. Michael’s grace tinges at the motion. Raphael shares the same easy companionship Artemis and Michael once had when Michael was Athena. She has missed both of them.

            Artemis realizes what she has done after a moment and looks resolutely away. She walks out of her living room the mortal way, moving into a bright spacious kitchen covered all in white. Michael follows.

            The kitchen is bare, in the way that all non-mortal spaces are. It is stocked, but only in a way that makes it sort of looked used. Apollo must still move among the mortals then. In the fall out when the pantheon lost their power to the Romans and Michael and Gabriel revealed themselves, Artemis swore she would never speak to mortals again. But Apollo always loved them too much.

            “Would you like some tea?” Artemis asks after a moment. “Apollo picked it up in a trade with Kuan Yin and now we have too much of it. Or is that just another item you _angels_ go without?”

            “I am sorry for what happened, Artemis.” Michael says. “You all were very good to me. “

            “We were your family.” Artemis bares her teeth into tiger fangs. Michael has seen her borrow animal attributes far too much to be impressed.  “And a much better one than your lauded father ever was to you.”

            “We have both suffered much.”

            “You know nothing, ‘soldier of God’. When you left, father lost what little sense he had left. His favorite child, his successor, was nothing but a sham. And he grew mad. And then Demeter was killed by one of yours. Did you actually think we would just go on without you?”

            “Demeter was not killed by one of mine.” The conversation holds resonances Michael is very uncomfortable with. She wishes she could flutter her wings – all of them – in defense, a move she had grown far too familiar with in the cage. But she is too limited with this fragile vessel. Michael turns away. It is always easier to say hard things when you aren’t facing someone. “And if it makes you feel better, consider vengeance for her taken. The one who destroyed her is locked up. And now he is never getting out.”

            “Father is dead.” Artemis says.

            A wave blasts through Michael’s vessel. She struggles to label the emotion – shock? Grief?  But no – this is not her father. This is Zeus. “I am sorry for your loss.”

            “Damn it, Athena!” Artemis yells.  “What did you think would happen? I had to _kill him myself_. You have no idea what that’s like?”

            “That is not my name.” Hot rage pours through Michael’s blood, mixes with her grace. She is aware of pushing against her vessel, of threatening to spill out, growing bigger than her body. “And I have every idea of what it’s like. You know nothing of my pain.”

            Artemis stands her ground, baring her feline fangs again. Her eyes flash into that of a hawks and a rhino’s armored plates cover her shoulders. This Michael knows. A good fight, a solid assured victory. She is powerful. She is an archangel. She is ageless.

            _You made a deal_ a voice whispers in her ear, older than time itself. Michael stiffens. She is bound by this vessel. If she breaks it, well…

            “No,” Michael grits out, finally. “I cannot fight you, Artemis.”

            Artemis slowly fades back into her baseline semi-mortal appearance. “It’s the boy.” She says.

            Michael tilts her head yes. Yes. She has weakened and crippled herself for Adam and can’t bring herself to regret it.

            “You’ve never been attached before.” Artemis considers Michael for a moment. Michael lets her. Tilts her head back for examination. Something in Artemis’s eyes softens.  “Alright. I will let you stay here. Both of you. But you have to help me. The pantheon is scattered and I am not made to lead. Apollo is in denial. And change is in the air.”

            “My fault.” Michael says. She looks back at Artemis and considers her in turn. It is a day for making deals. “Yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is the prologue to my planned "Book of Adam" series. The work may be slow, but I've got a plan!  
> This will start parallel to Season 8 and run to the present place in the series.
> 
> The "alternate character interpretation" in the tags is in regards to Artemis, as it may be clear. I refuse to believe she had a thing for Prometheus, as a die hard Classics fan.


End file.
